The next generation of high technology materials for the use in, for example, aerospace and aircraft applications will need to possess high temperature capability combined with high stiffness and strength. Plates and shells fabricated from laminated composites, as opposed to monolithic materials provide the potential for meeting these requirements and thereby significantly advancing the designer's ability to meet the required elevated temperature and structural strength and stiffness specifications while minimizing weight.
Laminated composites of these types generally comprise relatively long lengths, preferably continuous throughout their length, of a reinforcing fibrous material such as a ceramic, carbon, and the like, in a matrix of a metal such as aluminum.
Currently, the metal matrix materials, so called prepegs, that form the basis for these laminated systems are very expensive to produce, and, in some cases of variable properties along the length of the laminate, both of which conditions have inhibited their proliferation and use in the aforementioned applications.
Accordingly, it would be highly desirable to have methods and apparatus for the manufacture of such metal matrix composite prepeg materials that is reliable, relatively inexpensive and produce a consistent product with the properties desired by aerospace and aircraft designers.